


Making Home

by ChubbyHornedEquine



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Good Omens plantstore AU, Human Aziraphale (Good Omens), Human Beelzebub (Good Omens), Human Crowley (Good Omens), Light Angst, M/M, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-16
Updated: 2019-08-16
Packaged: 2020-09-01 21:09:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20264545
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChubbyHornedEquine/pseuds/ChubbyHornedEquine
Summary: I've never written a fic that's so canon-divergent so I really hope the characters are still recognizable lol! This was a lot of fun!





	Making Home

**Author's Note:**

> I've never written a fic that's so canon-divergent so I really hope the characters are still recognizable lol! This was a lot of fun!

Eden Florists, 4004 Bentlee Courtyard, sat nestled snuggly between a coffee shop and a chiropractor's office. They supplied the indoor plants for both. They also provided flowers weekly for the front desk of the small hotel on Main Street, the sandwich shop, and a very nice old lady that lived above the pharmacy on Apple Street. Although small, they were well known in town for how vibrant their flowers were, how fragrant. They were known for how all of their plants just seemed...happy.  
  
The owner of Eden Florists looked exactly like the sort of person that would maybe feel more at home in the tattoo parlor off on Dowling Street. They often wore their long red hair back in a ponytail or a braid, slightly tinted shades, even indoors, black nail polish. Their wardrobe seemed to consist entirely of blacks and greys and red. Except for their work apron. Which was a bright green, _Eden Florists_ embroidered along the top edge. Their nametag read, "A.J.", their face had a slightly permanent scowl etched into it that said don’t talk to me, and they weren’t allowed to handle the register anymore because they often found reasons not to sell the plants the customer was _trying_ to buy and if the customer managed to succeed in escaping with their claim, the owner scowled after them the entire time.  
  
It was nothing short of a miracle the store had managed to do as well as it did with the way A.J. treated anyone that wanted to do more than look at their plants.  
  
That miracle’s nametag read, “Bee”. Ae was another one that looked as though ae ought to be working in literally any other store than the one ae were at. Unlike A.J. however, Bee was very good with the customers, at least to their faces.  
  
“Why,” asked Bee once, “do you run a plant shop if you don’t actually want to sell any of them?”  
  
“Dunno,” A.J. had said with a shrug. “I know I can’t keep them all, and they deserve good homes, it’s just hard to see them go.”  
  
Bee scrunched aer face. “They’re…plants, A.J. They’re not like dogs or cats or any pet. It’s just a plant.”  
  
“Nothing is ever ‘just’ something,” A.J. had said.  
  
\-----  
  
It was a quiet Wednesday afternoon when it happened. Bee came in first, watering can in hand, water sloshing out all over the floor.  
  
“Bee!” A.J. said. “Someone’s going to fall in th—“  
  
“He’s coming this way.”  
  
“Who?”  
  
Bee held out a thumbs up which ae then slowly and dramatically lowered, as though aer thumb was wilting.  
  
A.J.’s face dropped, “No.”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
“No. He’s probably going to the coffee shop.”  
  
“He’s never been to that coffee shop and you know it!”  
  
A.J. whispered some reassurances to the plant they’d been pruning before making their way to the front of the shop. Bee was already half leaning out the front door.  
  
“Is he still coming?”  
  
Bee nodded solemnly. “He doesn’t even have the decency to look ashamed.” Ae leaned back into the shop, “He’s got to know we won’t sell to him, right?”  
  
A.J.’s scowl deepened. They didn’t really have grounds to refuse selling to him. Only what they’d heard. Only the rumors of A. Z. Phale.  
  
“Even his name betrays him,” Bee said. “’Fail’ is right. I’m going to go outside and make sure the flowerboxes don’t wilt when he walks by.”  
  
Ae didn’t wait for a response before slinking back out and taking up a post in front of the flowers, not at all subtle in the way ae watched Phale come down the street.  
  
He seemed pleasant enough. A.J. had never actually met the man in person before, but he was surprised to see they looked to be the same age. Even though he dressed like a professor being kept prisoner in the bowels of a university that was also trapped in some kind of time bubble.  
  
His sweater vest was a light brown, the shirt he wore underneath a pale blue. A.J. realized, when he came into the store and was standing in front of them, that the blue matched his eyes. A.J. might have found it a little endearing if they weren’t distracted by the bowtie he wore. A bowtie? Really? _Really?_  
  
“Hello,” he said, glancing around nervously. “I was hoping I could buy a plant from you?”  
  
“You’re A. Z. Phale,” A.J. said.  
  
“I am! But please, you can call me Azi. I…don’t really like the way ‘Phale’ sounds on its own.”  
  
“You kill plants.”  
  
“Well…not intentionally.”  
  
“Involuntary manslaughter is still manslaughter.”  
  
“Oh…well I…I don’t think I’d use the word ‘slaughter’.”  
  
A.J. raised a brow.  
  
“Perhaps there’s a sort of…beginner’s plant? But not a cactus, please.” He looked off to the side, absently rubbing his arm, “My shop is very small and they’re very pokey.”  
  
Behind him, Bee was making jabbing motions at Azi’s back. A.J. ignored aer. “What kind of shop do you own?”  
  
“A bookstore!” he said proudly.  
  
A.J. stared at him.  
  
He stared back, a small smile on his round face. His eyes were so bright and hopeful.  
  
“You want me,” A.J. said slowly, “to sell you one of my beautiful plants so that you can take them back to your mausoleum?”  
  
“I don’t think it’s that dusty…”  
  
“It’s a _bookstore_.”  
  
Azi blinked.  
  
A.J. sighed, “What are books made of?”  
  
“Um, words? Or do you mean, physically, like the pap—oh.”  
  
“Yeah. _Oh._”  
  
“Oh dear,” he twisted his hands together. “I never thought of it like that.”  
  
“It’s not just sunlight and water, they need a healthy and supportive environment too.”  
  
“Healthy and supportive,” he said with a quiet nod. “Right. And I… can’t provide that. Yes, I suppose that makes sense.”  
  
There was such an air of sadness in his voice when he said it that A.J. immediately felt guilty. Obviously plants being around books wouldn’t destroy them, he hadn’t expected the man to react so intensely.  
  
“You’re a bit of a legend, Azi. Why do you want them so bad?”  
  
“Oh, it was just…just a silly dream I had. Thank you for your time.”  
  
And with that he turned and left, waving and smiling amicably at Bee as he passed aer. Bee, in turn, made a face that might be called a grimace if one wanted to be polite about it. Ae then came in, making some comment about how dare that guy think he could get his grubby little hands on one of their plants and—  
  
But A.J. wasn’t listening.  
  
_Just_ a silly dream?  
  
\-----  
  
Several days later, A.J. left work early, a small plant in their arms. The walk to the bookshop wasn’t long, and although they knew where it was, they’d never actually been before. It was much bigger than they thought it’d be but when they tried to peer in through the windows, all they could see were books stacked in the sills, maybe a lamp or two. They went to the front door, which was locked, and the sign stating the hours didn’t help much. According to the sign, the store should be open. It was Sunday, between 11am and 2:15pm and it wasn’t raining, as the sign made sure to note they would likely be closed as to keep wet umbrellas and the like away from the more fragile works, and it wasn’t the third Sunday of the month because for some reason that was noted as being a day they might be closed as well.  
  
A.J. lowered their sunglasses a fraction, wincing at the brightness of daylight, to better read the sign.  
  
“What the hell?” they muttered before knocking on the door.  
  
It wasn’t long before a voice responded, “Sorry, quite closed today!”  
  
“Why? The sign says you ought to be open.”  
  
“Ah, the addendum.”  
  
“The adden—“ A.J. looked back at the sign. Following the word “hours” at the top of the sign was an asterisk and at the bottom of the sign was another asterisk with a note that read: _Hours subject to change without prior notice or explanation._  
  
“Oh for—open the bloody door!”  
  
Quiet.  
  
Then, in a quiet voice, “I don’t know that I want to if you’re going to shout at me.”  
  
“I’ve brought you something.”  
  
Locks turned and the door edged open, Azi’s round face peering through, “Yes? Oh! Is that for me?”  
  
“If you let me in, yeah. I need to see the state of this place.”  
  
“Right…of course.”  
  
He stepped aside, A.J. slid in past him and oh, it was so much worse than from the outside. The windows weren’t just blocked with books but they were also dusty and some had stained glass which was very pretty to look at but absolute shit for light. “No wonder everything dies in here, there’s no sunlight.”  
  
“Well,” Azi said as he locked the door, “I’ve even tried plants that require low-light and—“  
  
“Low light is still light. It’s not light filtered through dust or,” they grabbed a book at random, “some dead person’s words.”  
  
“Oh.”  
  
A.J. was starting to second guess the decisions that led them to come all the way there with a plant in their arms. Trying to teach this guy how to not murder every green thing that came into his hands would involve some major reorganizing of his shop.  
  
“Why do want plants so bad?” they asked as they set the book back down.  
  
The book seller shifted, “I said, just a stupid dream—“  
  
“What’s the dream?”  
  
He swallowed, “It’s—it’s nothing, it’s just a—“  
  
“Alright then, I’m leaving.”  
  
“No wait! Wait.” Azi rubbed his hands together, “I…have a large family. Lots and lots of siblings and there was always someone nearby to talk to or,” he chuckled, “just as likely to talk _at_ you and even though I don’t talk to most of them anymore, and even when we lived together we didn’t really get along too well…I miss them. I miss that feeling of having someone, something living nearby. Someone to talk to. It was always crowded and I don’t know, I had the idea that I could sort of replicate that…with plants. I sort of imagined a bookshop with all these books and all these plants and it would be tight and crowded and like home but…_my_ home. My version of it. That’s…pretty ridiculous I know. And you said they need a healthy and supportive environment which…to be honest I don’t have much experience with. So. Yeah.”  
  
The two stood in awkward silence. That had not been what A.J. was expecting at all. And the way Azi said he didn’t have much experience with a supportive environment…despite living with so many people? They couldn’t imagine how deep a statement like that must run, all the different things it could mean.  
  
“I’m sorry,” A.J. said.  
  
“It’s alright, not really your faul—“  
  
“No, I’m sorry for what I said back at the shop. I was being an ass. Of course you can have plants in a book store, it’s not…it’s not detrimental to them.”  
  
“Oh.”  
  
“Yeah. I didn’t realize how important this was to you. It can be done. It’ll,” they looked around the shop, blowing a loud breath out, “it’ll be some work, but it can be done. I’ll even help.”  
  
“Really?”  
  
“I’m always hesitant to sell my plants. I don’t want them winding up just anywhere. Where they can be ignored or mistreated. But you clearly want only the best for them.”  
  
“I do!”  
  
“Then yeah, I’ll help. Here,” they held out the plant, “this is called a snake plant.”  
  
“Oh! I had one of—“  
  
A.J. moved the plant aside, as though out of earshot, “Let’s not talk about his predecessors right now, hmm?”  
  
“Right,” Azi said sheepishly.  
  
“How about we get started? Cause this…is going to take a few days.”  
  
The book seller reached out and gently took A.J.’s arm, “Thank you. Really it means the world to me. Thank you, A.J.”  
  
“Anthony,” they said. “The ‘a’ is for Anthony.”  
  
“Oh that’s lovely.”  
  
“And you? What’s your ‘a’ for?”  
  
“Angel.”  
  
Anthony nodded, “Alright then. Let’s go, Angel.”


End file.
